Emerging manager hedge funds and CTAs up 0.17% in February (+1.93% YTD)

March 22, 2013

Emerging manager hedge funds and managed futures funds ended February almost flat, according to a first estimation based on the data of 229 funds listed in Opalesque Solutions' Emanagers database.

The Emanagers Total Index gained 0.17% last month and is up 1.93% year-to-date. Estimates for January and December were corrected to +1.76% and +0.81%, respectively. Since inception in January 2009, the index posted compounded returns of 67%, compared to 41% for the Eurekahedge Hedge Fund Index and 53% for the MSCI World Index.

Trading strategies brought mixed results: The Emanagers Hedge Fund Index was up 1.09% (+3.60% YTD), while the Emanagers CTA Index lost 0.96% (-0.36% YTD). However, the CTA Index result is influenced by one extreme outlying observation (a monthly loss of 30%), while the rest of the group was virtually flat.

Emerging managers performed worse than their established peers in February (Eurekahedge Hedge Fund Index: +0.19%, Newedge CTA Index: +0.10%) as well as the MSCI World Index, which gained 0.22%.

Except for managed futures, all hedge fund trading strategies won last month:

- In the first two months of 2013, the ranking is led by event-driven (+7.97%) and directional investment strategies (long-bias: +5.27%, long/short: +3.07%), followed by multi-strategy (+2.84%), relative value (+2.34%) and global macro hedge funds (+1.56%).

Over the past 12 months, Opalesque calculated MSCI-correlation coefficients of 85% for Emanagers hedge funds and -31% for Emanagers CTAs, resulting in equity-market betas of 29% and -14%.